Mirror...should buying a mirror really be this hard?

Another day, Kate, Lisa and I decided we wanted to go to the local “mall”. It is a collection of stores, but only about 10. They are all high end clothing stores, but also a grocery store and a store called Game. This is the closest thing to a Walmart as it comes. They have oddest assortment of things, but never quite where you would think it would be placed. It took a lot of wandering to find what we needed. One thing I got was an alarm clock. I purchased the cheapest one (still over $20) but when I got it home, I realized the foolishness of the purchase. For one thing, it can never by my only alarm because of power failure. We don’t often lose electricity for long periods of time (only once so far), but it does go out and come back on rather frequenly. That means that my clock is constantly being reset. So after resetting it a few mornings in a row, I began to get frustrated. When the power does stay on…I began to notice something else. The clock doesn’t keep time. Every day it moves ahead of real time by about 1 hour. So the time is never quite right between the two problems. I had to laugh at myself. But I guess you learn. I had wondered why there were no alarm clocks in the houses….

Also that day, I purchased a mirror. BUT there was some confusion at the register, one person didn’t have enough money and we couldn’t get that through to the cashier. I think it is hard to believe that Mzungos (white people) could run out of money. So in the midst of all this, I put down the mirror and forgot to pick it up. Once I got home, I realized my error, but had no way to return the store without spending about $50. So the next day I found a friend who helped me translate a line in Swahili saying I had left the mirror and needed it back. I wasn’t able to remember the line though (it was very long) so I ended up reading it off. The man at the information desk thought this was hilarious. So in my limited Swahili I told him that I was a teacher here and was learning Swahili. As many places there were a few more people standing around who all thought this was hilarious and began teaching me. The one man began asking me questions about who I was married to, and if I was dating. He decided to teach me the phrase, “I love you” and “My lover”. I told him that I didn’t need those phrases, but he seemed to think that I did. The other guy wanted to marry me and the third guy took my Swahili notebook to write some phrases…and also give me his number. It was a hysterical conversation…I ended up getting my mirror back, a marriage proposal, and a phone number. Not bad for one shopping trip!